Remember Rita

That's what our local officials are saying. Remember the storm that ripped through here 3 years ago. I don't want to remember Rita. I don't want this thing to be anything like Rita.

Rita was the first storm I've ever evacuated for. Ever. When I was growing up and a hurricane was forecast, my job was to scrub the tub and fill it with water. So when my phone rang one morning and my mom asked what were we going to do, I was confused. People were leaving and I didn't understand that. After going to a gas station and finding out that they ran out of gas just before I got to the pump, I was in full panic mode. I remember the stress, the tears and trying to get my family ready to leave as fast as I could.
My parents still had Katrina evacuees at their house when we headed out of town. We drove as far as Athens, Texas that night and got some sleep. The next day we made it a little further North into Texas. After the storm had passed, Bobby headed back to help and I went to Plano to stay with a friend.
I remember being in Wal-Mart when Bobby called and said that we had some damage to our porch but our mobile home was fine. Such sweet relief. More tears right there in the middle of Wal-Mart. Tears of relief.
It would be two full weeks before Bobby let me come home with the kids. We still did not have electricity, but my parents did. We stayed with them for a few days and then we had electricity and could go home.
As I drove back into town after people had worked for more than two weeks cleaning up the damage, it was worse than I thought it would be. More tears. This is our home town, our community, our neighbors, our friends. It was so hard to see.
I know that we were very lucky, especially since we lived in a mobile home at the time. So it's not my personal experience with my home that makes comparing this to Rita so hard. It's that I really don't want our community to have to go through that again.